even known at our Lady of the Mountain what Jansenism is."
"So much the better; go, there is nothing I will not do for you."
He dismissed the prior in this affectionate manner, but thought no more about him.
Time slipped away, and the prior and his good sister were almost in despair.
In the meanwhile, the cursed bailiff urged very strenuously the marriage of his great booby son with the beautiful Miss St. Yves, who was taken purposely out of the convent. She always entertained a passion for her godson in proportion as she detested the husband who was designed for her. The insult that had been offered her, by shutting her up in a convent, increased her affection; and the mandate for wedding the bailiff's son completed her antipathy for him. Chagrin, tenderness, and terror racked her soul. Love, we know, is much more inventive and more daring in a young woman than friendship in an aged prior and an aunt upward of forty-five. Besides, she had received good instructions in her convent with the assistance of romances, which she read by stealth.
The beautiful Miss St. Yves remembered the letter that had been sent by one of the king's guards to Lower Brittany, which had been spoken of in the province. She resolved to go herself and gain information at Versailles; to throw herself at the minister's feet, if her husband should be in prison as
